Italy has announced plans to bring in mandatory origin labelling for tomato-based products, bypassing EU procedures and sparking fears for the unity of Europe's single market.

Agriculture minister Maurizio Martina said on Monday (4 September) he was working with the minister of economic development Carlo Calenda to extend mandatory origin labelling to processed tomatoes and tomato-based products.

The move comes just weeks after Italian authorities unveiled a decree implement a two-year trial for mandatory origin labelling for pasta and rice​​, requiring manufacturers to indicate the country of origin of the grains used to manufacture processed rice and pasta items on packaging.

The move is intended to counter growing competition coming from imports of Chinese tomato puree which, according to Coldiretti, the association that represents the Italian agricultural sector, increased by 43% in 2016.

Further fragmentation

Manufacturing trade group FoodDrinkEurope (FDE) warned of the dangers it presented to the single market. "This national unilateral initiative is yet another step towards the further fragmentation of the EU Single Market for foods, one of the core foundations of the European Union. [...] This will negatively affect the competitiveness of the ​

relevant food sectors, undermine the smooth functioning of the single market, and hamper intra-EU and international trade," ​a spokesperson said.

"The situation is no longer tenable for producers who are facing ever more additional burdens and barriers to trade."​

However, Coldiretti welcomed the announcement. “In the face of the uncertain and contradictory attitude of the European Union, which has authorised origin labelling for eggs but not egg products, for fresh meat but not processed or for fresh fruit but not juices […], Italy, a European leader in transparency and quality, has the duty to act as a food policy pioneer,” ​it said in a statement published on its Italian website.

Senior food policy officer for EU consumer group BEUC Camille Perrin said Martina's decree was a "good move​" for consumer clarity. “It's only fair for consumers to know if tomatoes in a sauce marketed as "made in [country X]" come from another country,” ​she tweeted.

Not in line with EU law​

“The recent pattern of legislative activity by Italy's Ministry of Agriculture, Mr Martina, on origin labelling of ingredients are not in line with EU law, and not backed by impact assessments. Without impact assessments, it is unclear if they are beneficial to Italy's economy,” ​he said.

The country’s farming sector believes that mandatory origin labelling will stamp out the practice whereby many foods marketed and sold as ‘made in Italy’ do not use

Bucchini echoed this, saying that while the rules may help farmers, they will create problems for Italy's food industry.

“If Italy's food industry relied on Italian farms only for ‘made in Italy’ food, its market size would shrink. Much Italian olive oil is not from Italian olives, for instance,” ​he said.

No notification​

Italy has also ignored EU rules which require member states to notify the Commission of any planned national legislation. This allows other member states to study the proposed law and raise objections or make comments for the Commission to consider.

The decree on durum wheat, for instance, raised objections from 11 member states.

However, a Commission spokesperson confirmed to FoodNavigator that it was not informed of the tomato decree and this, according to Bucchini, means it is likely to be inapplicable under EU law.

Copycat COOL?​

France was the first country in the EU to bring in mandatory country of origin labelling for processed dairy and meat products which was permissible under EU law for a three-year trial period. The move sparked a number of countries to follow suit, with Greece, Finland and Portugal all notifying the Commission of origin labelling trials for meat and/or dairy.

But Bucchini believes this time there won’t be the same ‘copycat’ action. “I think there is growing consensus that Italy has gone too far […) so rather than copycats we are likely to see more opposition and the EC stepping in,” ​he said, adding that – with Italian elections drawing closer – the decree may be an exercise in winning votes among Italy’s significant farming community.

7 comments

of course it is nationalism coming at the back door disguised as transparency

Posted by micheline beauchemin,
16 November 2017 - 14:17 GMT

Unfortunately, Italy is also the country with the highest level of food frauds. Maybe a clean up would indicate that transparency is the goal. Looking at the sheer number of countries getting on the bandwagon of "origins" starting with the complex rules of the Swiss cross is a clear sign of nationalism at work.

In theory good. However...

Posted by Jonathan Scharf,
27 September 2017 - 12:13 GMT

While I do agree that transparency is a good thing, from an industry point of view, I don't know how this can be implemented. The ingredient list for pizza for example would be miles long if you have to label every origin of your ingredients. Not to mention if you have to buy from multiple different countries.
The only way I can think of to do this would be to link the consumer to an online website for more information (which could go down or be inaccessable for some people) or print the packaging for each production batch (which would be expensive and consumers would have to check every time if something has changed)

Transparency is good

Posted by Paolo Bartoli,
07 September 2017 - 09:48 GMT

The italian position is correct. The origin of food should always be clearly evident. It is a right of the citizen and the industry should have no fear of being clear. On the contrary, it may dramatically improve its marketing.